UTMB Faculty Senate Minutes
Monday, October 9, 2023
SON/SHP Building | Marie Hall Room, 4.622 | 4th Floor
4:30PM-6PM

Open Senate Meeting:

  1. Call to Order – Shannan Rossi, PhD, MBA, Faculty Senate Chair
  2. Attendance “Roll Call” & Establishing Quorum
    • GSBS – Maria Micci
    • JSSOM – Amy Gonzalez
    • SHP – Rajkumar Rajendran
    • SPPP – Monique Pappadis
    • SON – Rebeka Watson Campbell
  3. Agenda Adoption
    • Consent Agenda Adoption - Approved
  4. Review & Approval of Minutes– No Minutes for September, please see recording on the Faculty Senate website.
  5. Welcome Aaron LeMay (VP, Financial Accounting & Reporting and Interim Chief Business and Finance Officer) and Gabe Hernandez (Vice President of Finance, Academic Enterprise).
    • Financial Update: Actual to Budget YTD August

      UTMB Adjusted Margin:
      Actual $<14.1> M
      Budgeted $ < 18.1> M
      Favorable $ 4.0 M

      • Volumes are generally favorable against an aggressive growth focused budget, but..
      • One-time favorable net adjustments of $42.6M were not related to ongoing operations.
      • UTMB managed down external contract labor, but premium and overtime payments grew substantially.
      • Increase in rates and volumes are driving up supply expense against the budget.
    • Financial Update: Actual to Prior YTD August

      UTMB Adjusted Margin
      Actual $ <14.1> M
      Prior Year $ 1.6 M
      Unfavorable $ <15.7> M

      • Operating revenue grew by 10.1% over PY operations.
      • However, operating expenses also grew by 9.3% over the same period.
      • The majority of expense growth came from overtime work, premium labor, strategic hiring, along with market & merit adjustments.
      • Volumes, price and mix are all contributing factors to 15.3% supply expense increase over PY.
      • Discharges and Encounters growth over FY23 Actual 6.6% and 8.8%, respectively.
      • CMI improvement from 1.54 to 1.61
      • 3.6% increase in surgical cases
      • $30M Net to Expected rate improvement.
      • New Providers- (Support Staff, timely provider enrollment turnaround, ramp up)
      • $65 million-Prioritized for workforce planning: Supporting, retaining & recruiting, merit, market, Faculty & Staff Incentive Plans
      • Employer Paid Benefits: State Employer Contribution rate increase for Teacher Retirement System, Premium Health Insurance Rate increase-7.5%, Retiree Health Benefits increase of $5.7 million.
      • Supplies: Overall Medical supplies 2.8% growth on price, Pharmaceuticals Supplies 5.0% growth on price, Savings Opportunities-Health System: $9M.
      • Services & Other: On-going and new contractual escalations, Property Insurance $3.2 M Increase, Environmental Services$3.0M Increase, Savings Opportunities-AE: $1M; Inst. Supt.: $3M.
      • General Revenue Base: $7.7M increase in Hospital Operations Mission Specific Formula, UTMB’s Medical Education and Nursing Education strategies experienced a decrease of $1.2M and $1.6M respectively. General Revenue Benefits: UTMB HEGI Cap increased $2.1M from $54.4M to $56.4M
      • Net Investment Income-Other Net Investment Income: 4.5% - Short Term Fund; FY23 trending at 5%, Royalties: $1M; unknowns surrounding licensing and expiring patents.
      • Interest Expense:
        • $23.7M - Existing RFS Debt @ 3.75%, $4.5M, CP Interest Equipment @ 3.5%, $7.1M – Future CP Interest @ 3.5%, $1.4M - John Sealy Hospital Phase 3, $.2M - LCC, Phase 3, $5.5M – Clear Lake Hospital, $2.7M - GASB87/88/96.
    • Take home message: UTMB will continue to invest and expand, which will impact our rating in the future (move from A2 current to projected A3 for several years after). Targeted areas for revenue generation include increased research grants and patient-driven services (clinical services). Areas of expense include, but not limited to, losses from faculty/staff retention and interest expenses. Overtime pay was a major driver in FY23, which was addressed.
  6. Review of Faculty Advisory Council (FAC) meeting from Austin- Oct 5-6, 2023
    • Drs. Rossi, Svoboda, and Messenger attended FAC in Austin Oct 5-6. We met with several representatives from UT System. The major topics of discussion included the implementation of SB17 and SB18 and faculty burnout.
  7. Unfinished Business & General Orders
    • -None at this time.
  8. New Business
    • The chair will entertain a motion to move into executive session (closed session) for committee meetings.
    • Discussion of committee assignments
  9. Announcements: None

  10. Adjournment